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David Suzuki: No social justice without climate action

In Canada, the interests of the global fossil fuel industry are prioritized over those of citizens. It’s time for a new way of thinking.

In his recent encyclical, Pope Francis recognized the connection between environmental protection and social justice, writes David Suzuki. (GABRIEL BOUYS / AFP/GETTY IMAGES)

By David Suzuki

Fri., July 3, 2015

The world is shifting on the related problems of climate change and social inequity. From Pope Francis’s encyclical to the International Monetary Fund’s admission that “trickle down” economics have failed to a court decision ordering the Dutch government to do more to address climate change, people are waking up to the fact that our survival, health and prosperity are incompatible with systems we developed for a different time and different conditions.

As demands for change grow worldwide, Canada remains mired in a fossil fuel economy, with a government that’s out of step with Canadians and the world. An overwhelming majority of citizens want decisive action on these issues, and Canada, with its educated population and abundant resources, is in an ideal position to take advantage of the growing opportunities in the emerging global green economy.

The government may be out of step, but Canadians are walking in step on the July 4 National Day of Action and the March for Jobs, Justice and the Climate in Toronto the following day. Thousands of people, many representing a diverse range of organizations — environmental, labour, church, Indigenous, social justice, youth and more — are hoping to send a clear message to delegates to the Climate Summit of the Americas and Pan American Economic Summit in Toronto July 7 to 10.

March organizers say politicians and delegates are faced with a choice — and it’s not between protecting the environment or the economy. Rather, they can either “listen to corporate leaders from across the Americas gathering to advance an economic austerity agenda that is increasing inequality and causing a climate crisis felt disproportionally in the global south — or listen to the people.”

Participants will march in four contingents, representing the movement’s priorities: improving social justice, creating clean jobs and healthy communities, finding solutions, and calling out those who are responsible.

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In his recent encyclical, Pope Francis recognized the connection between environmental protection and social justice, saying, “The human environment and the natural environment deteriorate together; we cannot adequately combat environmental degradation unless we attend to causes related to human and social degradation.”

We see this in Canada, where the interests of the global fossil fuel industry are prioritized over those of citizens. This is especially true when it comes to Canada’s treatment of aboriginal people. Many live in communities without access to clean drinking water, often near polluting industrial operations, such as Ontario’s Chemical Valley and Alberta’s oilsands. The Mikisew Cree and Athabasca Chipewyan First Nations in Northern Alberta have had little say in the pace of oilsands development, yet they have been profoundly affected by pollution, loss of wildlife, contaminated water and more.

At the same time, government and much of the mainstream media appear to be hell-bent on promoting (and subsidizing) rapid oilsands expansion and pipeline development with little concern for the consequences of pollution and global warming, and with little attention to the tremendous opportunities for healthy communities and a healthy economy from clean technology and renewable energy and efficiency.

It’s absurd and extremely short-sighted that a country like Canada, with its energy resources and vulnerability to climate change, doesn’t even have a national energy strategy.

The current and relatively recent fossil-fuel-based global economic system once offered tremendous benefits for human societies, but it emerged during a time when resources were abundant and we didn’t fully understand the consequences of our actions — from exploding population growth to resource depletion to social inequity to pollution and global warming.

Fossil fuels are undeniably amazing substances — solar energy captured by plants and compressed and concentrated over millennia, useful for numerous applications, many of which we probably haven’t discovered. Yet we’ve burned them wastefully, largely so people, often solo drivers, can move around in tons of metal and plastic on land-destroying and expensive infrastructure. And we’ve used them to create increasing amounts of plastic packaging and unnecessary products that are now choking our oceans and land.

We can and must change. People all over the world taking part in marches know it. Religious leaders understand it. Global organizations such as the World Bank, International Monetary Fund and World Health Organization are talking about it. In Canada and elsewhere, municipal and provincial or state governments have been leading the way.

As world leaders prepare for the global climate summit in Paris in December, it’s time for them to join this growing, diverse groundswell of people who are showing the world the need and possibilities for a better way.

David Suzuki is a scientist, broadcaster, author and co-founder of the David Suzuki Foundation.

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